end of the tube around, so that no light could come in there except through this small opening in the paper, which was so put on that the eye must look through the middle of the glass. He also pasted some strips of brown paper around the other end of the telescope, jutting over the object-glass just enough to keep it from breaking, and to prevent any light from coming through the edges, but not letting the paper touch this glass, as it did the eyeglass. The object-glass wants all the light it can get.

The boys had the first look; but they could see nothing, though the woods to which the glass was turned were yet visible.

"What's the focus of the glasses?" asked the parson.

"Thirty-six inches and one inch," was the correct answer.

The boys marked where the thirty-six inches ended, measuring from the object-glass. They then brought the eyeglass up to within about an inch of that, and looked through it again.

"Oh-oh-oo!" exclaimed Frank: "I see the trees so near that I can get hold of them, but they're bottom side up!"

"Yes," said their father, "but that will make little difference when looking at Jupiter or the moon."

They all had to wait what seemed a long time for the darkness to come, and let the stars appear. When the parson returned from the post-office after tea, he said it would be impossible to hold the tube in the hands steadily enough to see the planets plainly. So he found a strip of board about a foot long and two or three inches wide, which was hollowed out on one side. Into this hollow he fixed the tube by common tacks and small wire. Then through the middle of this strip he bored a large gimlet hole, and put in a long screw, and went to the workshop in the basement to make a standard into which to screw the strip which held the tube. He couldn't find nor make just what he wanted soon enough—the boys said that "Jupiter had just come out clear"—and so he caught the first box he could lay hold of, and screwed the tube upon one of its sides, just tight enough to hold it snug, yet let it move up or down. Then he called for a light stand, and case knives to make it and the box stand perfectly still. He took his place on the portico, got everything ready, and said he was "afraid to look for fear the boys would be disappointed." Frank said he "would like to look," and so, as he had been the most anxious to have the telescope made, his father gave him the first chance to be glad or sorry. After moving the box and the tube a little all kept silent, but soon Frank began a louder "Oo-oo-oo!" than before, and, much excited, exclaimed: "I see 'em: four red bright little fellows, all in a straight line," and then he ran as if half crazy, shouting, to his mother: "We got 'em, mother, all four of 'em! I wouldn't swap our telescope for any other. Come and see!"

The parson too was much delighted. As he happened to look at the other side of the box, he was amused to find that he had mounted his telescope on a "Eureka Soap" box. In a few days he made an upright standard, into which he bolted the telescope just tight enough to hold it, but let it move freely. A common screw becomes too loose in a little while. The instrument cost the parson only forty cents for the tubes; the glasses were given, but ought not to cost more than a dollar or two. If a one-inch eyeglass can not be had, a two-inch eyeglass will answer quite well. The reason for having two tubes is that eyes differ, and that what is bought for a thirty-six inch glass may be an inch or two more or less than that, so that the smaller tube must be moved back and forth till the eye finds where the view is plainest. This instrument shows the moon beautifully. You read of the circular mountains and the extinct volcanoes; here you see them. It is especially delightful to see in the new moon the light breaking over the mountain-tops and through the notches while all the plain behind is yet in the dark. Though it is now a good while since the parson made the telescope, he waits impatiently every month for the new moon to come again.

THE MAGIC BOTTLE.

There are few persons who have not been puzzled, when witnessing the exhibitions of conjurers and performers of feats of legerdemain, by the magic bottle, out of the neck of which the exhibitor can pour any one of quite a number of liquids at his will. It may interest the reader to see an explanation of the means by which the apparently magical effect is produced, especially as it involves an explanation of a certain philosophical principle which it is very useful for all to understand.

The pressure of the atmosphere all around us is so great that no liquid can issue against it from a close vessel, unless air is at the same time admitted to balance the external pressure by an internal one of the same amount. In the case of pouring water from a bottle the mouth of which is tolerably large, the air passes in in large bubbles as the water comes out, producing the gurgling sound always heard in such a case.

Where the orifice is too small to allow of the admission of these bubbles of air, the liquid will only flow out as fast as the air is allowed to enter in some other way, as shown in the engraving, where the water will not issue from the lower end of the tube except when the finger is raised from the upper end so as to admit the air.

There are various ingenious contrivances by means of which curious effects are produced through the operation of this principle. One, called the magic tunnel, is made double, with a space inclosed between the walls. There is an orifice communicating with this chamber at the top of the handle, which orifice is so situated that it can be opened or closed at pleasure by the thumb of the person holding it without attracting the attention of the spectator. Now if the body of the tunnel is filled, or partly filled, with pure water, while the hidden chamber contains a liquid deeply colored—with cochineal, for example—the person holding it can cause pure water to flow from it by keeping the orifice in the handle closed by his thumb, or colored water by simply raising his thumb and allowing the liquid in the concealed chamber to flow out and mingle with the clear water as it issues from the tube below.